Basic Healer Evaluations

*You can use these basic instructions for looking at dps too. Just replace the word ‘healing’ with ‘damage’ and look at the damage done, damage by spell and damage by actor screens.*

When looking at any raider’s performance, it’s best to look at single boss kills (or attempts) specifically. To look at a specific fight, choose it from the blue navigation bar at the top.

Full Report > Bosses > choose a boss > choose an attempt

Healing Done

To get to this screen from the navigation menu: Dashboard > Healing Done

This screen that will give you general information about healing done by everyone throughout the fight. It’s broken into two parts: a graph showing a timeline of the fight and a table breaking down how much healing was done.

First we’ll look at the table:

Healing isn’t all about numbers, so this part of the log isn’t terribly useful. Output will depend heavily on class/fight/healing assignment. However, you can tell a few things. Healers with extremely low output may sound some warning bells. Active time is a good thing to look at, it shows how much time was spent healing. Low numbers here are sometimes due to deaths, or it could be your healing assignment isn’t taking damage for part of the fight, or there could be downtime (like the times that Magmaw’s head is down and he’s not doing any damage).

If you mouse-over any player on this chart, you will see a breakdown of the 5 abilities that did the most healing. You’ll want to look at the next, more in-depth section for healer breakdowns, but these quick looks can give you basic information. For example, on this chart if I mouseover one of our our elemental shaman, I can see that he used his Healthstone and Gift of the Naaru (yay!).

Now we’ll look at the graph:

The default option is for the graph to show total healing (the top yellow bar), along with the top 3 healers. If you want to see all healers, or look at one person individually toggle the checkboxes next to their names in the table below.

This is really useful for getting an overall view of both healing output and major events during the fight.

The vertical red lines indicate player deaths. Hovering over the bar will show the last 3 sources of damage the player took.

Vertical orange lines (not shown) show combat resurrections.

The vertical green line indicates boss death.

The vertical blue bar shows the duration of bloodlust/heroism.

The healing lines give a good indication of the damage patterns of the fight. The above graph is from Magmaw. You can tell when his head is down by the huge drop in overall healing.

To see the dps equivalent of these stats, use Dashboard > Damage Done

Player Details

If you want to look at one player specifically, there are two ways to do it:

1. Choose the player’s name from the healing chart of a specific fight

2. In the top navigation: Players > class > name

This page will show multiple tabs for looking at different things.

Healing by Spell

This shows a single healer’s entire healing breakdown for the fight. Things to look for include:

Breadth of spell selection – Is the healer using all their available tools?

Group vs. Single target heals – Is a tank healer using mostly group heals? Is a raid healer casting too many direct heals?

Overheal – Are heals being wasted?

Specifics of what to look for in specific healer classes are shown below.

Healing by Actor

This provides a breakdown of who the healer healed. How useful this page is depends on how stringent the healing assignments are. If someone is assigned to heal a tank, that tank should be on top of the list. A raid healer should have healing love spread out among most players who were in range of them.

The table on the left is a sample of a Magmaw kill. My general healing strategy is to keep HoTs on the MT and heal the raid. You can see from this example that the MT got 28.2% of my heals and the rest were spread out on everyone else. I am the second person on this list because keeping myself alive is my second highest priority.

Buffs Cast

To analyze this page, you really need to know the class/player you’re looking at.

Uptime on certain spells – Earth Shield, Lifebloom, Chakra, Beacon of Light, etc. Were these kept up as close to 100% as possible?

Power gains – Were the players using their mana regenerating abilities

Buff Details

If you want to dig a little deeper into spell uptimes, click the # beside an ability you are interested in, which will bring up a timeline of how the ability was used during the fight.

Above you can see my uptimes on Lifebloom and Harmony. From this you can tell:

I did not have Lifebloom stacked on a tank (or anyone else) before the pull.

I did cast a direct heal before the pull to trigger Harmony from the very beginning.

You can also see every time one of these buffs fell off. If you mouseover the green bar beside Lifebloom, you can see who Lifebloom was on at that time. The very bright green spots indicate that I was in tree form and have Lifeblooms on multiple people. The dark spots show where it fell off. In the last half of the fight the small amounts of downtime are due to switching Lifebloom from one tank to another.

When things go wrong

Raiding isn’t always sunshine and rainbows. People die, raids wipe, new bosses have their way with you for hours until the fight finally clicks and you get a new kill. When things go wrong WoL provides a lot of information that can help you figure out what’s causing problems.

Deaths Overview

To get to this screen from the navigation menu: Dashboard > Deaths Overview

When a player dies and you are unsure of the cause or who was at fault, look at the deaths overview for that specific boss fight. This page will show you a list of all deaths during the fight (to a certain point…it seems to stop tracking after a number of people have died) along with the last 3 damaging abilities to hit them, like this:

Clicking on the more link will show a greatly expanded view of the last events before death, including damage taken, healing taken and any abilities used by the (soon to be dead) player.

The whole log is far too long to show here, but it tells me why I died. One factor is that a Shadow Nova got off – but it’s not the real reason. The reason I died was that I didn’t get a single heal during this fight, not even from myself.

The three icons at the top right give you the option to show Power Gains, Spell Casts and Buffs & Debuffs. I find turning on power gains and spell casts makes the log very bloated, but buffs & debuffs are very helpful to see debuffs (like Halfus’s Malevolent Strikes) or player abilities (Shield Wall, Barkskin, etc.).

Some things to look out for in the death logs:

Who was healing (or not healing) the player before they died?

Did the deceased player take avoidable damage? Did they stand in a fire or a cleave? Did a dps pull aggro and get smacked by the boss? Did the Shadow Priest use Shadow Word: Death at a really bad time?

Did the player do what they could to avoid death? Did they use damage mitigation cooldowns, a healthstone or potion? Did they heal themselves?

Survivability

To get to this screen from the navigation menu: Dashboard > Survivability

This is a really good resource on wipe (or “learning”) nights, when a fight just won’t go your way. The Survivability screen will point out who’s living the longest and who’s usually dead. I find it most useful to look at survivability on all attempts on a boss at once.

The chart is nicely broken down by boss attempt, class and player. It’s also color coded – grey if the player lived until the bitter end, pale yellow if they survived for almost the whole fight, orange for survivability around 80% and red for early deaths. The column on the right shows overall survivability. Hovering over any percentage value on this chart will show the last 3 sources of damage before the player died.

Damage Taken by Spell

This is another good thing to look at when you run into problems on a particular fight. First, go to the Dashboard for the fight you want to look at (we’ll look at Atramedes). Look at the Damage Taken by Spell section.

Here we see all the spell damage taken by the raid during the fight. Much of this damage is avoidable, including Sonar Bomb, Devastation and Sonic Breath. Click on the ability you are interested in to see how much damage each player took from the ability. Let’s pick Sonar Bomb:

So here we see total damage taken and the number of times people were hit with Sonar Bombs. Clearly some people need to improve their movement skills during air phase.

Specific Class Evaluations

Restoration Druids

Here are specific things to look for when analyzing resto druid logs. It’s best to look at specific kills or attempts in order to get meaningful numbers.

Druids are primarily Heal Over Time (HoT) healers with great mobility and a decent amount of utility. Though Druids have generally been considered raid healers, they can also be strong tank healers. In 5.4, a Druid’s healing output should be high.

Healing from Lifebloom, Rejuv, Wild Growth, Regrowth, Swiftmend, Efflorescence and Tranquility should be seen on every fight.

Healing Touch, Nourish and Wild Mushroom: Bloom may more sparingly. Whether Nourish is used a matter of personal choice, though it will not provide much healing (I haven’t even had this keybound since all expansion). Healing Touch should only be used in combination with Nature’s Swiftness. Wild Mushrooms will mostly provide some healing on fights where the raid is stacked up.

You should not see healing from Renewal; this is a poor talent choice for a healer.

Top Spells

A druid’s top spells will vary depending on the nature of a fight and how spread out the raid is. Wild Growth and Rejuv will generally be at or near the top on any fight. Efflorescence should also be up there, especially on fights where the raid is grouped up. Tranquility can also be one of the top spells for healing done when it is timed well and can be used multiple times throughout a fight. If the Druid is tank healing, expect to see Lifebloom and Regrowth higher on the list.

Overhealing

Druids will generally have high overheal because of the nature of their HoTs. This isn’t something to worry about. Lifebloom and Rejuv will have quite high overheal while you should see lower overheal on smart heals like Wild Growth or direct heals like Regrowth.

Notes on specific spells:

Lifebloom

Uptime is the key metric here. Lifebloom is our source of Omen of Clarity procs and provides a steady stream of heals to whoever it’s placed on (usually a tank). It should be pre-stacked before the pull, moved around to whomever needs it most and not allowed to fall off. Allowing a 3-stack to fall off, unless it’s timed perfectly to provide an emergency heal from the bloom, means you have to waste time and mana building the stack back up. Lifebloom uptime should be in the 90-100% range on most fights.

Tranquility

The first thing to look for is whether Tranquility was used at all. It is our best spell in terms of HPS and HPM and should be used on every fight. With a 3 minute cooldown it can be used 2-3 times on most fights.

Next look at the number of direct heals – Each Tranquility should tick at least 20 times (more if the Druid has a lot of haste or uses Soul of the Forest and casts it after Swiftmend). See the 12 direct heals in the screenshot above? This means my Tranquility was interrupted (I cast it before a Shock Pulse like a bad Druid).

Overheal should be fairly low, but the HoT portion of the spell can increase this number.

Swiftmend

Check how many times Swiftmend was used by looking at the number of direct heals. Swiftmend has a 15 second cooldown, so it can be used 4 times per minute. It’s unrealistic to use SM every time it’s available but it should be used often (especially if the Druid is specced into Soul of the Forest).

Since Swiftmend is no longer mainly a vehicle for Effloresence, overhealing has become more important to look at. Since this spell is instant, overheal should not be too high.

Efflorescence

Efflorescence should make up a good amount of a Druids healing, as it should be active pretty much all the time. It will do more healing on fights where the raid is stacked, but should do a fair amount even on fights where the raid is spread out or moving a lot, since it’s so easy to move now.

If healing from this looks low if could mean the Druid is not keeping the spell up via a Mushroom all the time, is not moving it appropriately, or is not using the Gylph of Efflorescence (which is terrible). If you’re in raid with the Druid, make sure the green Efflo circle is not often out in the middle of nowhere.

Wild Mushroom: Bloom

How much healing WM does will depend on the fight. Personally, I don’t like to bloom Mushrooms much, unless the raid is stacked and taking significant damage. Blooming your Mushroom means 3 seconds before you can get Effloresence down again.

Nature’s Vigil

NV is the strongest talent in the level 90 tier so you should see healing from it on most fights. If used close to on cooldown (as it should be, since the cooldown is short) it can provide a large amount of healing.

Cenarion Ward

If the Druid has this in their spec, the most important thing to look for is overheal. If the overhealing on the spell is very high, the Druid is not using it optimally.

Direct Heals

Direct heals should not make up the bulk of a druid’s healing, but Regrowth should be used fairly often. Low use of direct heals will likely mean that Clearcasting procs are being wasted.

Healing Touch should mostly be used in combination with Nature’s Swiftness, unless the Druid has the 2T16 set bonus, in which case you should see it used fairly often.

Spirit of Chi-Ji

This is the proc from the legendary cloak. The healing from this is not really controllable and how much healing it does will depend on the fight. Expect this to make up anywhere between around 4-10% of total healing.

Buffs Cast

This screen will tell you how often a druid is using their cooldowns, along with the uptime on key abilities.

Lifebloom – As noted above, uptime should be as close to 100% as possible.

Harmony – This is Druids’ mastery which increases the effect of all HoTs while it’s active. Harmony should be up as much as possible, look for 90%+ uptime. If uptime is much lower, the druid needs to cast more direct heals to keep it active.

Barkskin – Barkskin can be used once every 45 seconds. It should be used often to mitigate damage taken (though not necessarily on cooldown). If a Druid is only using it once or twice a fight they should be using it more.

Tranquility – As noted above, Tranquility should be used on every fight. You should see at least 20 ticks per use.

Nature’s Vigil – Nature’s Vigil has a 1.5 minute cooldown. The talent should be taken on most fights and it should be used close to on cooldown.

Innervate – Innervate has a 3-minute cooldown. It should be used at 70-80% mana the first time, then whenever it’s off cooldown to get as much mana as possible.

Ironbark – This is a damage reduction spell Druids can cast on someone else, it has a 1 minute cooldown. It should be used often on every fight.

Nature’s Swiftness – This spell makes your next spell with a cast time instant, larger and mana free. It has a 1 minute cooldown. This spell is often used for emergency heals, but you should see it used at least a few times on every fight.

Clearcasting – Compare the amount of Clearcasting procs to the number of Regrowths cast (this is found in the Healing by Spell tab). The Druid should have at least as many Regrowth casts as CC procs.

Trinkets – If the druid has an on-use trinket equipped, check the cooldown on it and the amount of times used. They should be used the maximum amount possible.

Movement abilities – On fights that require movement or kiting, look for things like Dash, Stampeding Roar or Displacer Beast too see that the Druid is making the most of their abilities.

The following are talents, so whether they appear in a Druid’s logs is spec-dependent:

Incarnation – Incarnation has a 3 minute cooldown. In your average 4-7 minute fight it should be used twice. A third use can be squeezed into fights that last longer.

Heart of the Wild – If the Druid has this in their spec, you may not see it used. It’s generally only used on fights where the Druid has the room to stop healing and do some damage. Otherwise, it’s just taken for the intellect buff.

You should also check to see if the Druid is using abilities given to them by Symbiosis. For the list of those, check here.

Druids also have a new spell, Genesis, which speeds up existing Rejuvs. Unfortunately, this spell will only show up if you search for it in the Log Broswers or Expression Editor.

Holy Paladins

Here are specific things to look for when analyzing holy paladin logs. It’s best to look at specific kills or attempts in order to get meaningful numbers.

Healing Done

Paladins are great tank healers and are also very strong at healing the raid when they are grouped close together. They have a number of utility spells and cooldowns to juggle. Holy Paladins should be evaluating not just on their output but also how well they make use of their abilities.

Healing by Spell

There are a number of things to look for on this screen, including:

Spell selection – Is the paladin using all their available spells?

Paladins have: Divine Light, Holy Light, Beacon of Light, Holy Shock, Holy Radiance, Word of Glory, Light of Dawn, Lay on Hands, and passive healing from their Mastery – Illuminated Healing. They also have either Eternal Flame or Sacred Shield (level 45 talents) and one of Holy Prism, Light’s Hammer or Execution Sentence (level 90 talents). Healing from all of these spells should be seen on most fights. The only spell that is not typically used much is Flash of Light due to it’s poor mana efficiency (though it can be excellent on fights where mana doesn’t matter so much).

Top spells – A paladin’s top spells will vary based on the fight and their assignment, though Illuminated Healing will generally be at or near the top on any fight, along with Eternal Flame if the Pally has taken it. For fights that are heaviest on tank damage Beacon should be doing a lot of the healing. When the raid is grouped up, Holy Radiance will often be one of the top heals even if the paladin is assigned to tank heal.

Overhealing – Overhealing is dependent on spell. Spells like Beacon of Light and Holy Radiance will generally have high overheal, which cannot be avoided so it is not a useful metric to look at. However targeted, single target spells such as Divine Light and Holy Shock should be low on overheal.

Notes on specific spells:

Divine Light vs. Holy LightTwo slow, direct healing spells. Divine Light costs 3x the mana and heals for 3x as much and gives Holy Power if cast on the Beacon target. The amount these spells are used will depend on the fight and damage taken. Check the amount of overheal on these two spells. If the overhealing on Divine Light is too high (nearing or over 40%), the paladin may be wasting mana and should be relying more on Holy Light. Paladin have so many other spells to use, and group heals that transfer through Beacon that you may not see a lot of use of either of these spells.

Holy Shock

Holy Shock should be used on cooldown to maximize Holy Power gains. Though it won’t be on top in terms of healing done, it should be near the top in terms of number of times it is cast. It has a 6 second cooldown, or 4 seconds with 4T14. Compare the number of direct heals to the maximum number of times it can be cast.

Holy Radiance and DaybreakDaybreak is a buff that you get every time you cast Holy Radiance. The buff will make your next Holy Shock cast within 6 seconds duplicate into a second heal that will heal all targets within 10 yards of the initial Holy Shock target. If Holy Radiance healing is high, but Daybreak doesn’t make up at least a few % of total healing, the Paladin is likely not using Holy shock appropriately.

Word of Glory (or Eternal Flame) and Light of Dawn

These are the spells that use up Holy Power. Word of Glory/Eternal Flame should be used more often when tank healing or people are spread out, while Light of Dawn becomes more useful as people are grouped up, or damage is more bursty. One of these spells (or a combination of them) should make up a significant portion (20%+) of total healing. If they don’t, the Paladin may not be using their Holy Power optimally.

Lay on HandsThe first thing to look for is whether Lay on Hands was used at all. In addition to providing a huge amount of healing, with Glyph of Divinity LoH also returns mana. Though it may not get used on every fight, it should be used on most fights. A lack of LoH over a raid night should set off warning bells.

Tier 3 TalentsTier 3 gives Paladins a choice of 2 new healing spells (yes there are 3 options, but Selfless Healer is the wrong one).Eternal Flame – This spell replaces Word of Glory, turning it into a 30 second heal over time. If the Pally has this talent, it should account for a lot of their healing, especially if they apply the HoT to as many raiders as possible. The HoTportion of Eternal Flame transfers to the Beacon at 50%.Sacred Shield – This provides a shield (can only be on one person at a time) which absorbs damage every 6 seconds. If the Pally takes this talent, SS should be up on their primary target all the time.You’ll also want to check the uptimes on these spells. (See next section)

Tier 6 TalentsPaladins get a choice of 3 new heals for their Tier 6 talent. These talents have very short cooldowns, and should be used often. Use can be delayed for predictable damage, or in combination with an output cooldown.

You should see healing from one of the following:Stay of Execution (from the talent Execution Sentence) – Single target heal over time. 1 minute cooldown. This is a good choice on fights with very heavy tank damage. You can see the number of times this was cast on the Buffs Cast screen.Holy Prism – Can be used as a single-target heal or a small area of effect heal. 20 second cooldown. This is the only option with a mana cost.Arcing Light (from the talent Light’s Hammer) – An AoE ground heal that lasts 17.5 seconds. 1 minute cooldown. Light’s Hammer is a good choice on fights where the raid is grouped up and more AoE healing is needed. Light’s Hammer’s heals transfer to the Beacon target at a rate of 15%.

Buffs Cast

This screen will tell you how often a paladin is using their cooldowns, along with the uptime on key abilities.

Beacon of Light – Paladins’ signature ability. Should be up all the time. If it’s cast pre-pull and never put on a new target, Beacon will not show up here. Make sure Beacon healing is present in the Healing by Spell tab.

Eternal Flame – If specced into this, it should always be up. Look for 95%+ uptime.

Sacred Shield – If specced into this, it should always be up. There are two buffs that will show up for Sacred Shield. You want to look for spell ID 20925. Uptime should be 90%+.

Guardian of Ancient Kings – When activated, it will heal the target of your next 5 heals and everyone within 10 yards of them. 5 minute cooldown. Will generally only be used once per fight, but can be used more on long fights. This should be present on every boss fight. GoaK will show up as a pet on the Healing Done screen.

Avenging Wrath – Increases healing and damage by 20% for 20 seconds, 3 minute cooldown. This should be used often, generally 2-3 times per boss depending on the length of the fight.

Divine Favor – Increases haste and crit chance by 20% for 20 seconds, 3 minute cooldown. This should be used often, generally 2-3 times per boss depending on the length of the fight. Can be paired with AW for a super cooldown. Click the # next to each of these spells to see if they’re being used together or separately.

Devotion Aura – Reduces magic damage by 20% and prevents silences and interrupts for 6 seconds. 3 minute cooldown. This should be seen on any fight with raid-wide magic damage. The chart will tell how many people were affected by it (which will include pets and things). Click the # next to the spell to see a when and how many times it was used.

Divine Protection – Reduces magic damage taken by 40%, 40 second cooldown. With the Glyph of Divine Protection, it will also reduce physical damage taken by 20%, and will reduce the magic reduction to 20% as well. This should be used often, whenever the Paladin is taking significant damage.

Divine Shield – Used in emergencies, it makes the Paladin invulnerable to damage. It won’t be used often, but if you find the paladin is often dying without ever using it, there is a problem. DS can be used with Hand of Sacrifice to prevent unfortunate deaths..

Hand of Sacrifice – This is great for times of heavy tank damage. Paladins should be making regular use of this. It has a 2-minute cooldown, but if specced into Clemency, the spell can be cast twice before incurring a cooldown.

Hand of Salvation/Protection/Freedom – These are situational spells. They probably won’t be used too often, but I see their proactive use as a sign of excellent raid awareness.

Hand of Purity (optional talent) – If the Pally is specced into it, you should see it used on fights with hard hitting DoTs (like bleeds or magic effects). It has a 30 second cooldown.

Trinkets – If the paladin has an on-use trinket equipped, check the cooldown on it and the amount of times used. They should be used the maximum amount possible.

Seal of Insight – Has a chance to give mana back on melee swings. Should have 100% uptime. This does not always show up under buffs. If it doesn’t, check the Power Gains table on the Buffs Cast screen. Since the paladin will not always have the opportunity to melee the boss, this may not be a big source of mana.

Divine Plea – Restores mana over 9 seconds at the cost of reduced healing, 2 minute cooldown. If glyphed, the spell has no healing penalty, but a 5 second cast time. This should be used often. If a paladin complains about running oom, but doesn’t use this close to on cooldown, there is a problem.

Discipline Priests

Here are specific things to look for when analyzing discipline priest logs. It’s best to look at specific kills or attempts in order to get meaningful numbers.

Healing Done

Discipline priests are the masters of mitigation. They are great tank healers but are also capable of putting out a huge amount of absorbs on the raid through Spirit Shell, DA and PW:S. Disc Priests have a wide variety of spells and cooldowns to manage.

With few exceptions, Spirit Shell and Divine Aegis should be a Disc Priest’s top heals. Spirit Shell is extremely powerful when used correctly. Atonement and Power Word: Shield should be up there as well. On fights with lots of raid damage, the Tier 6 talent (usually Cascade) should also provide a lot of healing.

Spells that may show not show up in the logs much – or at all – include:

Flash Heal: For lesser geared healers, Flash Heal should be used in emergencies only since it is extremely inefficient. For healers who are overgeared and/or have access to a lot of mana cooldowns, it may show up more frequently.

Renew: This spell is very weak for Disc Priests. It may be rolled on a tank or cast on the move, but overall it should not make up a significant portion of healing done.

Heal: Though Heal is very efficient, it does relatively little healing. Priests may not use it in favour bigger, more expensive heals.

Notes on specific spells:

Power Word: Shield

Power Word: Shield should be kept up on the tank(s), or cast on anyone else taking very heavy raid damage. PW:S should be cast often – at least every 12 seconds for the Rapture proc, but usually more often than that. You want to see fairly low overhealing on this.

PenancePenance is a fairly cheap heal that hits 3 times in rapid succession. It is an excellent way to get a 3-stack of Grace up on a target, and is also great for Atonement heals. This should be used close to on cooldown (cooldown is 9 seconds). Priests should be using Penance more for Atonement healing than direct healing.

Power Word: Solace

On most fights, you want to see that Priests have taken (and are using) Power Word: Solace as their Tier 3 talent. It provides a free, instant, smart heal so is great in terms of both HPS and HPM. It has a 10-second cooldown and should be used often.

The only reason for a Disc Priest to not take PW:Solace is if the extra damage from Mindbender is really needed.

Atonement

Atonement in the healing by spell tab

Atonement healing in the damage by spell tab

There are three spells Priests can cast offensively that cause Atonement healing: Penance, Smite and Holy Fire (or Power Word: Solace, depending on talent choices). To see how these spells are being used, check the damage by spell tab. Penance is the most efficient, powerful heal and should appear at the top of damage done, followed by Smite, then Holy Fire/PW:Solace.

CascadeCascade will be a Disc Priests tier 6 talent of choice in most situations. It’s a smart heal that heals 15 people and has only a 25 second cooldown. You should see this used often and providing a fair amount of healing on any fight where the raid is taking significant damage.

Prayer of MendingPriests should be casting this on cooldown so it should provide a fair bit of their healing. With the 2T15 bonus, PoM should account for even more.

Void Shift

This is a newer cooldown for Priests that allows them to switch their health with the health of their target. It’s not something that will be used on cooldown or anything, but it you should see it used at least a few times over the course of a raid. Check the amount healed (it should be high per cast) to see if the Priest is faster with VS than your Pallies are with LoH. There is a slight delay in the health exchange after this has been cast.

Buffs Cast

This screen will tell you how often a priest is using their cooldowns, along with the uptime on key abilities.

Prayer of Mending – PoM should be cast on cooldown and be up as much as possible. 80%+ uptime is a good target for most fights. However, if the fight has people constantly taking damage (like Tortos) it will likely run out of charges before the cooldown is up again and the uptime will be lower (probably around 60%.)

Grace – With Disc Priests’ focus on Atonement healing, Grace is a bit of an outdated mechanic. If the Priest is strictly assigned to tank healing, you want to see Grace up on that target all the time. However, since Discs are such powerful raid healers, Grace uptime is likely to be low and not something to worry too much about. Grace uptime should be higher in 10s than 25s.

Inner Sanctum / Inner Will – One of these should be up all the time. However, if the Priest casts one of these before the fight begins and never switches it, it won’t show up here.

Hymn of Hope – Hymn of Hope restores mana to the raid and should be used on every fight. It has an 8 minute cooldown. You should see 12 ticks to indicate that it was channeled for the full duration.

Archangel – Archangel consumes stacks of Evangelism, giving 5% increased healing per stack. It has a 30 second cooldown and lasts 18 seconds, so the maximum uptime is 60%, though it won’t be up this often in practice. You want to see the Priest using Archangel often throughout the fight, and only when they are at 5 stacks of Evangelism.

To see how Evangelism and Archangel are being lined up, click the # beside both. Hovering over the Evangelism bars will show how many stacks it was at. You want to see 5 stacks before the Archangel bar lights up.

Inner Focus – Inner Focus makes your next spell cost less mana and a guaranteed crit. It has a 45 second cooldown and should be used often. A good practice is to use Inner Focus before a PoH while Spirit Shell is active.

Clicking the # next to Inner Focus and Spirit Shell will show you if these things are being lined up, as they are in the example above.

Pain Suppression – Pain Suppression has a three-minute cooldown. Its use will often be prescribed by the raid leader. You should see PS used 1-3 times on most fights, depending on length.

Power Infusion (optional talent) – Power Infusion reduces casting time and the cost of spells. It has a 2 minute cooldown. It should be used often. Pairing it with Spirit Shell can make a very powerful combo.

Trinkets – If the priest has any on-use trinkets, or racials like Arcane Torrent they should be used as much as possible. Compare the cooldown to the amount of times used.

Other things to look for

There are a few important things that won’t show up under Healing Done or Buffs Cast, and you’ll have to look for them using the Expression Editor.

Power Word: Barrier

To find out how often PW:B is used, you need to use the Expression Editor. Go to Dashboard > Expression Editor and add in the following (replace the sourceName with the name of the priest):

sourceName = "Priest"and (Spell = "Power Word: Barrier")

This will show you how many times PW:B was cast. If you want more details, such as how many people were affected by the Barrier, just use (Spell = “Power Word: Barrier”) as the query.

ShadowfiendThis restores mana to the priest and does some damage too. Shadowfiend has a 3 minute cooldown. Paste in the following query (replace the sourceName with the name of the Priest):

sourceName = "Priest"and (Spell = "Shadowfiend")

If the Priest has specced into Mindbender, it has only a 1 minute cooldown. Paste in the following query (replace the sourceName with the name of the Priest):

sourceName = "Priest"and (Spell = "Shadowfiend")

No matter which ability the Priest has, you should see it used first within about a minute of the start of the fight and then again whenever it’s off cooldown.

Holy Priests

Here are specific things to look for when analyzing holy priest logs. It’s best to look at specific kills or attempts in order to get meaningful numbers.

Healing Done

Holy priests are mainly raid healers who are capable of great AoE burst healing. They have 2 difference Chakra states that can increase the effectiveness of their group or single target healing. With a huge array of spells at their disposal, holy priests have a heal for every situation.

Healing by Spell

Is the priest using the appropriate spells?

Holy priests have a big, diverse selection of healing spells. How often each of these spells are used will depend on assignment, raid composition and personal preference.

The main raid healing spells are: Prayer of Healing, Circle of Healing, Prayer of Mending, Renew and Holy Word: Sanctuary on fights where the raid is grouped up.

The main single-target healing spells are: Binding Heal, Holy Word: Serenity, Flash Heal, Greater Heal and Renew. Which single target spell is used most will depend on the priest and the fight.

Unless assigned to tank heal exclusively (which won’t happen much) a Holy Priest’s top spells will generally be Prayer of Healing, Circle of Healing and Divine Hymn. Though the big AoE spell will make up the biggest percentage of total healing done, single target spells should also show up on any given fight.

Spells that should not show up in the logs much include:

Power Word: Shield: This spell is weak for a Holy Priest and generally not worth casting, especially if there is a Disc Priest in the group. Power Word: Shield should mostly be used for the Body & Soul speed boost.

Heal: Though Heal is very efficient, it does relatively little healing. It can be used as a filler spell during times of low damage but it shouldn’t make up more than a couple percent of overall healing.

Overheal

Overheal doesn’t mean a lot for a Holy Priest. The nature of spells like Prayer of Healing, Holy Word: Sanctuary and Echo of Light will push the overheal numbers up. Though the single target spells should have low overheal, as long as the priest isn’t running out of mana and their assignments are staying alive, overheal isn’t a big concern.

Notes on specific spells:

Lightwell

When glyphed, Lightwell has 15 charges. How much healing Lightwell does depends on how much the raid uses it, which can’t really be controlled by the priest. It has a 3 minute cooldown and should be up as much as possible. In many situations Lightwell should be dropped before the pull (which won’t show up on the logs for the fight) so it can be dropped again sooner – unless its use is otherwise specified. Check how many times the Priest placed a Lightwell by clicking on Lightwell Renew on the Healing Done page. Look at the Buffs tab and divide the buff count by 15 (and round up!) to see how many times it was dropped over the course of the fight. Also check that the priest is making use of their own Lightwell.

Desperate Prayer

Instant, free and heals the priest for a ton of health. Priests with this talent should be using this on every fight. Multiple uses with low overheal show the priest is aware of their own health levels.

Flash Heal vs. Binding Heal

Since most raid fights involve significant raid damage, Binding Heal should be used more than Flash Heal most of the time. Use of Binding Heal shows the priest is taking care of themselves in addition to the rest of the raid and is a great tool in situations where the priest and their assignment are both taking damage. Binding Heal is also more likely to proc Surge of Light for free, instant Flash Heals.

Divine Hymn

Divine Hymn has a 3 minute cooldown, so it can be used multiple times per fight. Besides the healing it provides it also increases healing done to those it heals by 10%. It should be used on every fight.

Divine Hymn is affected by haste. The base amount of ticks is 20, but with haste or when used under the effect of Bloodlust/Heroism it will often tick 25 or 30 times. You should see at least 25 direct heals from Divine Hymn. If it’s less, the priest is probably using it at a bad time and had to interrupt the cast before it was finished.

Buffs Cast

This screen will tell you how often a priest is using their cooldowns, along with the uptime on key abilities.

Prayer of Mending –PoM should be cast on cooldown and be up as much as possible. 80-90%+ uptime is a good, attainable target.

Hymn of Hope – Hymn of Hope restores mana to the raid and should be used on every fight. Like Divine Hymn it has 12 base ticks but is affected by haste. You may see 15 ticks.

Fade – Fade is something to look for if the priest has pulled aggro on something. If they’re pulling aggro and getting killed without using Fade, there’s a problem.

Guardian Spirit – GS is a life saver with a 3 minute cooldown (2.5 with the glyph). It should be used often. GS shows up under buffs cast which will show you the number of times it was cast.

You can check to see if it was actually triggered by looking under Healing by Spell. If Guardian Spirit shows up here, it was triggered and saved someone from dying. Even if GS is not triggered, it still provides a 40% healing buff on the target.

Trinkets – If the priest has any on-use trinkets, or racials like Arcane Torrent they should be used as much as possible. Compare the cooldown to the amount of times used.

Other things to look for

Chakra – If the priest stays in the same Chakra state for the whole fight, it will not show up in the Buffs Cast section. However, you can tell while state they are in by their spell use. If you see Holy Word: Sanctuary, then are in Sanctuary state, which increases their AoE healing. If you see Holy Word: Serenity they are in Serenity state, which increases their single target heals. On fights with distinct phases with changing damage patterns of single target vs. raid damage a good holy priest will switch between Chakra states. When this happens Chakra will show up under buffs cast. The combined uptime should be close to 100%.

Shadowfiend – Shadowfiend restores mana to the priest and does some damage too. It should be used on every fight. To make sure it’s used, go to the player details and check the Buffs Gained screen. You should see Mana Leech in the Power Gains table. If Shadowfiend is used while under the effects of Hymn of Hope, mana gains will be greatly increased.

Restoration Shaman

Here are specific things to look for when analyzing resto shaman logs. It’s best to look at specific kills or attempts in order to get meaningful numbers.

Shaman are versatile healers who can do well at either tank or raid healing. They really excel on fights where people are grouped up and they can make the most of spells like Healing Rain and Chain Heal. Though Shaman do not have a huge assortment of healing spells to choose from, they a lot of buffs and cooldowns they need to manage throughout fights.

In a 25-man raid, a Shaman’s top heals will generally be Healing Rain, Healing Stream Totem and Healing Tide Totem. On fights where the raid is tightly grouped Chain Heal will be up there, while Riptide will be higher on fights where people are more spread out. Earthliving and Restorative Mists can also provide a sizable amount of healing.

If the Shaman is assigned to tank heal, you should see more direct heals, like Greater Healing Wave, used.

In 10s, where tank vs. raid healing assignments are less stringent, Shaman will likely cast a variety of both single-target and group healing spells. Because there are fewer people to stack up in 10s, Healing Rain and Chain Heal will not account for as much healing as they do on 25, and you will likely see Riptide and Greater Healing Wave accounting for a lot of healing.

For any assignment you should also see healing from Earth Shield and Unleash Life, though they are unlikely to provide more than a few percent of overall healing.

Overhealing

Spells like Healing Rain and Earthliving will cause Shaman to be fairly high on overhealing, this isn’t something to be concerned about.

Notes on specific spells:

Unfortunately, the Healing Done and Buffs Cast tabs don’t give much useful information on many important Shaman spells and cooldowns, so use of the Log Browser is often needed. I’ve provided query strings that you can paste into the Log Browser to find the spells you’re looking for. Just remember in each one you need to replace the name “ShamanX” with the name of the Shaman you’re evaluating.

Earth Shield Earth Shield should be up on a target all the time (more information in Buffs Cast section). The shaman’s direct heals are more effective on their Earth Shield target.

Healing Surge Due to the high mana cost, Healing Surge should not be used as a staple heal. When it is used, it should have low overhealing compared to HW or GHW, otherwise the Shaman is wasting mana.

Unleash Life

Unleash Life provides a small, mana-free heal and buffs the Shaman’s next direct heal by 30%. Healing Rain is included in this, so you should see Shaman casting Unleash Life before each Healing Rain. If Unleash Life use is low (or absent) there is a problem. Check the number of direct heals for Unleash Life – though use will vary per fight, you should be seeing at least 2 direct heals per minute of fight.

If you want to dive a little deeper, you can also check to see if the shaman is casting Unleash Life before Healing Rain in the Log Browser. Paste the following query (be sure to replace the Shaman’s name):

Then you can check the timestamps to see if Healing Rains immediately follow Unleash Elements casts.

Healing Tide Totem

Healing Tide Totem is an optional talent but because it is a very powerful cooldown, it’s what most Shaman will use on most fights. You should see a significant amount of healing from it on each fight. The number of heals the totem will do is dependant on haste levels when it is dropped (and is a little buggy, I believe), so there’s not an exact number of ticks you can look for. It will generally heal between 25-35 times per use.

HTT has a 3-minute cooldown and Shaman should be trying to get maximum use out of it.

Healing Stream Totem

WoL displays the healing from this very strangely. The Crits and Direct Heals columns are showing the same heals. The Ticks column is showing the number of non-crit heals. To get the total number of ticks from this, you need to add the numbers from the Ticks and Direct Heals columns. Like Healing Tide Totem, the number of times Healing Stream ticks is dependant on haste. You should generally see about 9 ticks per cast.

This is a powerful smart heal with only a 30 second cooldown, so you should see it cast often. If a Shaman’s healing is low, not using this spell enough is often the problem.

To see how many times the spell was cast, use the Log Browser, paste the following query:

This is another powerful cooldown that should be used on any fight. It has a 3-minute cooldown. To tell at a glance if it was used, check the general Healing Done tab. It will appear as a pet under the Shaman’s name. To see how many times it was used, you’re going to have to use the log browser:

Stone Bulwark Totem Stone Bulwark is an optional talent, but is very good on any fight with significant raid damage. It has a 1-minute cooldown and should be used often if the Shaman is taking damage. To tell at a glance if it was used, check the general Healing Done tab. It will appear as a pet under the Shaman’s name. To see how many times it was used, you’re going to have to use the log browser:

Mana Tide Totem Mana Tide is another important cooldown, not just for the Shaman, but for the rest of the healers in the raid. The only way to see how many times it was dropped is with the Log Browser. Mana Tide has a 3 minute cooldown and should be used as much as possible.

Call of the Elements Call of the Elements is a 3-minute cooldown that resets the cooldowns on all totems will a cooldown of 3-minutes or less. It should be used as much as possible so the Shaman can get in extra uses of Healing Stream and Stone Bulwark, as well as utility totems like Grounding or Tremor on certain fights.

The only way to see how many times it was used is with the Log Browser:

Buffs Cast

This screen will tell you how often a shaman is using their cooldowns, along with the uptime on key abilities.

Earth Shield – Earth Shield should be re-cast whenever it runs out. However, on fights with heavier raid damage, the Shaman may prioritize other spells over refreshing this. Look for uptime of around 80% or higher for raid healers. For tank healers, uptime should be close to 100%.

Ancestral Vigor – Whenever a Shaman heals a target, the target’s maximum health is increased. Since the Shaman should always be healing, uptime should be close to 100%.

Riptide – If the shaman is tank healing, Riptide should have an uptime close to 100% overall. You can look at the tank’s Buffs Gained screen to see the uptime of Riptide on them specifically. When raid healing, uptime will be lower but should still be around 70% or higher.

Tidal Waves – Tidal Waves triggers when Riptide or Chain Heal is cast. Since Riptide and Chain Heal are two of a Shaman’s main spells, you want to see high Tidal Waves uptime. If focused on the tank, uptime should be over 90%. If focused on the raid it will be a bit lower, but should still be over 70-80%.

Earthliving – Every heal has a chance to trigger Earthliving. The only thing to look out for is that there is healing from Earthliving present. If it is absent, or extremely low, the shaman has likely forgotten their weapon enchant or it has run out in the middle of the fight.

Ascendance – This is a major cooldown that copies and distributes all healing done by the Shaman for 15 seconds. It has a 3 minute cooldown, and should be used often.

Spiritwalker’s Grace – This spell allows the shaman to cast while moving for 15 seconds. It has a 2 minute cooldown, it should be used on movement-heavy fights.

Astral Shift – If the Shaman didn’t spec into Stone Bulwark Totem, they will probably have this. It has a 2-minute cooldown and reduces damage taken by 40% for 6 seconds. It should be used when they’re taking a lot of damage.

Ancestral Swiftness – This spell makes your next healing spell an instant cast and has a 1-minute cooldown. If the shaman has this in their spec it should be used frequently.

Elemental Mastery – Another talent on the same tier as Ancestral Swiftness, this increases haste by 30% for 20 seconds and has a 2 minute cooldown. It should be used often.

Ghostwolf – This allows Shaman to move faster and how often/if it’s used will depend on the fight. You should see it used on a fight like Blade Lord, but not so much on more stationary fights like Wind Lord. If a Shaman is not using this, they are missing some opportunities to get around/out of bad faster. However, they also shouldn’t be using it too often as you can’t heal while in Ghostwolf. Fire/Earth Elemental – If the Shaman is using the talent Prime Elementalist, an Elemental should be dropped once per 5 minutes of fighting (Fire Elemental can be dropped once every 3 minutes if glyphed). *See end of section for for more on this*

Water Shield – Water Shield provides passive mana regen along with mana return when the shaman is hit by an attack or critically hits with a healing spell. If it’s up all fight, you won’t see it in the Buffs Cast table, but the active mana returns will show up under Power Gains.

Telluric Currents – This is an optional glyph which causes Lightning Bolt casts to restore mana. If the shaman has this glyph you should see mana gained from Telluric Currents under power gains.

Other things to look for:

If the Shaman has specced into Primal Elementalist their Elemental can channel a healing buff onto them. If you check the Buffs Gained tab, you should see the buff Reinforce (if an Earth Elemental is dropped) or Empower (if a Fire Elemental is dropped). This has a maximum uptime of 60 seconds per Elemental cast, the aim is to have it up as long as possible.

Other Resources

DPS and Tanks

I’ve been able to find a few guides for how to evaluate specific dps and tank classes on World of Logs. Let me know if you know of any more.

Expression Editor

The expression editor is a great tool for going beyond the Healing Done and Buffs cast tab. Query building can be challenging though. Luckily, there is a great resource over at Plus Heal. Auracen has created a guide to query building and is also very helpful with responding to questions if there’s something specific you’re looking for. Go check out the World of Logs Expression Editor Guide if you want to learn how to dig deeper into the logs.